Water Margin people

“Isn’t that farming?”

When Lu Zhishen heard this, he felt that there was no change, just like when he was in charge of the vegetable garden, he changed from growing cabbages to growing leeks, but in the end he was still growing vegetables.

"Think of it this way. In the past, your vegetable garden produced ten baskets of vegetables a day, which was just enough to hand in. Now it can produce twenty baskets, which you can't even eat all of. You can sell the extra vegetables to buy meat and wine!"

Sun Lei explained.

Soon, loud crying sounds were heard from the greenhouse.

"What is this for?"

Wu Song frowned when he heard the sound. The voice sounded old and he knew it was the crying of those old farmers.

"They are excited, let them be excited for a while. If they are not excited, how can this thing be promoted? I don't want to go to their door with a stick and force them to do it!"

Sun Lei smiled and said that what he was doing was a good thing that would benefit ordinary people, and he didn't want to make it look so ugly. The reason why he invited these old farmers was because of their prestige in the local area. As long as they thought it was a good thing, everyone would accept it.

The banquet lasted for an hour, and the old farmers had already harvested the crops from three greenhouses. Baskets of potatoes, sweet potatoes, and corn were placed together. They even harvested the straw and vines, saying that they could be used to feed sheep and cattle.

There was no need for the soldiers to help, as the old farmers weighed the fruits themselves. Every time they weighed a basket, the smiles on their faces grew bigger, and they were extremely excited looking at the baskets piled up like a small mountain.

When everything was weighed, the old farmers knelt in front of Sun Lei with tears on their faces, begging His Majesty the Emperor to give them more seeds, and they would definitely pay more grain next year.

"Remember what you said!"

Sun Lei looked at those people with a cold face. He couldn't be too kind. Sometimes people are like this. If you greet him with a smile, he will ignore you. If you give him a cold face, he will be full of enthusiasm instead.

"Thank you, Your Majesty! Thank you, Your Majesty!"

The old farmers kowtowed with gratitude. With these, they no longer had to worry about hunger, which was something they had never dared to dream of.

"There are still quite a few greenhouses. Since you are all here, help us harvest. You are all experienced and nothing will be left out!"

Sun Lei looked at the old farmers and continued, he must make the yield of these new crops deeply engraved in these people's minds, all of this is for the purpose of promoting it as soon as possible, he knew that many people in the village were stubborn.

Naturally, the old farmers had no reason to refuse and they all agreed. They also wanted to see if the yield was the same in other places.

"Let's have these for dinner tonight!"

Sun Lei pointed at corn, potatoes and sweet potatoes. Since they were crops, he wanted to see how they tasted.

The cook quickly took the food down. This was not the first time Sun Lei had eaten these new foods, and the kitchen staff was already familiar with it.

……

Three days later, a grand ceremony was held at the Circular Mound Altar outside the water.

Sun Lei went up to the stage in a crown and robes. The three commonly used animals were not on the altar, but instead were corn, potatoes and sweet potatoes.

The confused people looked at the offerings on the altar and whispered to each other, thinking that the offerings were too shabby and that God might punish them.

"What do you know? What are the three animals? Those three are auspicious signs! The yield per mu is one or two thousand catties!"

Someone sneered at those who were whispering.

"Nonsense, what can produce 2,000 kilograms per mu?"

"Yes, do you think I have never farmed before?"

"If it can produce 300 to 500 kilograms of rice, it's the best fertile land!"

There were endless objections. In that era, people, even landlords, had to farm the land themselves, and they knew exactly how much grain the land produced.

"So you are fools! Have you ever seen that auspicious sign?"

He asked, pointing at the offerings on the altar.

Everyone shook their heads. They had been farming all their lives and had seen all kinds of crops, but they had never seen those three things.

"You know there is a golden mountain overseas, right? Niutoujin knows about it, right? That's where these auspicious signs were brought back from!" "Maybe that golden mountain is the immortal's fairy mountain, and these are the crops grown by the immortal!"

  People started to speculate that there were fairy mountains overseas, which had been passed down since ancient times. Wasn't Jinshan the residence of the immortals?

After saying this, no one dared to doubt it anymore. They had all seen the Niutou Gold, so there was no problem with the Golden Mountain, and it was reasonable to have high-yield grain under the Golden Mountain.

Gongsun Sheng came on stage, chanted some incomprehensible spells, and kept waving burning talismans, which made the people exclaim in surprise.

When everything was finished, Sun Lei began the ceremony of offering sacrifices to the heavens, and the people watching the ceremony followed suit and kowtowed continuously.

After the ceremony, the auspicious results were posted all over Liangshan City in the form of notices.

The people were extremely excited when they learned about such a high yield, but it was not available on the market and it was said that it had not been cultivated on a large scale.

The auspicious news made many merchants who hoarded grain nervous. If what the notice said was true, the price of grain would probably drop a lot next year.

"It must be fake! How can something produce 2,000 kilograms per mu? Have you ever seen it?"

"Yes, it must be to lower the price of food! There will be a war after the New Year, and there will definitely be a shortage of food!"

"Don't panic, food prices will definitely go up next year."

A group of grain merchants began to encourage themselves. It was no secret that Qi would send troops again next year. The army was still recruiting soldiers and the training was also going well.

"But what if it's true?"

Some people expressed different opinions. They said that the food they hoarded was bought from the public at high prices. If they could not sell it in time, the loss would be huge.

"No, they are all fake!"

Someone immediately emphasized it.

royal palace.

Sun Lei looked at the memorial in his hand and mechanically signed and stamped it.

"Father!"

Several children ran into the imperial study carrying plates. On the plates were fried potatoes sprinkled with chili powder and tomato sauce. This was the children's favorite food. Since it was made, they had several plates of it every day.

"How sweet! You know it's not easy for an old father!"

Sun Lei put down his pen and seal, picked up a French fry and started eating. This thing tastes the same no matter what time it is.

"Everyone, come and have something to eat!"

Sun Lei watched as the other officials arrived. The children brought a lot of French fries, and he definitely couldn't finish them all by himself.

Everyone started working immediately and came over to eat something and drink some tea.

"Your Majesty, potatoes are really good. They can be used as both vegetables and food. The most important thing is that they have a high yield!"

Xiao Jiasui said with a smile, with this thing, the Qi Kingdom will be as stable as Mount Tai.

"Of course they are good stuff, otherwise why would I let Li Jun make this trip? Gold is not as good as these things!"

Sun Lei smiled.

"By the way, has Li Jun submitted a petition to go to sea?"

Sun Lei asked casually.

"Yes, but I suppressed it. I've read Li Jun's logbook. The further north they go, the colder it gets. It's winter now, so we can't go out to sea!"

Xiao Jiasui said.

"Well, that's right. At least let them set off after spring!"

Sun Lei nodded and said that this time Li Jun wanted to explore a new route and verify the route from last time to prepare for a large-scale voyage. (End of this chapter)